Google, Microsoft and Facebook want to stop the next Heartbleed in a joint $3.6 million project

We recently published an article about who should protect the internet and detailed how the big internet companies should take it upon themselves to secure the internet, against attacks like the recent Heartbleed virus that attacks the OpenSSL software, I guess we were spot on. As today, Google, Facebook and Microsoft are coming together to change that, and hopefully spot the next Heartbleed before it can cause any havoc.

$3.6 million to fight the next HeartBleed

The Core Infrastructure Initiative, has now been formed by the Linux Foundation and according to the Executive director Jim Zemlin after Heartbleed, clearly something needed to change. “After we’re done updating our software and swapping our certificates, what can we learn? What can be done differently,” he says.

Zemlin further describes that their role as the Linux Foundation isn’t directing the money, they will just hold it while the members decide where will be used. Of course these members include giants like Google, Microsoft, and Facebook, along with hardware companies like Intel and Fujitsu, and cloud services groups like Rackspace and Amazon Web Services. They will each give at least $100,000 a year for the next three years. This means a total of over $3.6 million with twelve companies already on board.

Because of Heartbleed, Open SSL is at the top of the list, but it’s not the only item. ModSSL, PGP and OpenCryptolab were also mentioned as potential projects the initiative might support. We think this is the right move for these companies to do to safeguard the Internets.